Our last raid of the expansion was last Wednesday. We came, we saw, and we kicked Deathwing’s ass…again. But then we told everyone to take two weeks off. Go recharge. Refresh your batteries, and your mind, so you are ready to go when MoP launches. Of course, having all this down time makes me wonder what to do with myself as we wait for Tuesday, September 25. Oddly, I’ve found myself playing more WoW than I was before! I have good reasons though, I swear!

So during this down time, I’ve decided to take advantage of the faster Cataclysm leveling and push both my inscriptionist (warlock) and my enchanter (priest) to 85 so that they are ready to handle their respective professions. It’s been relatively quick, and my priest only has a level to go – after about two days of playing her somewhat sporadically. One thing that has surprised me a little bit is how much I’ve been enjoying priest healing. I’m not really sure why I didn’t level her sooner, maybe burn out – as 5 of my other classes at 85 were healers, but I think she is becoming one of my favorite healers to play, usurping a spot left vacant by my paladin. It’s really a bit odd – I loved my paladin up until 4.3. And then the playstyle just felt a little flat to me and I stopped playing her. I don’t know if I can really explain it better than that – paladin healing just didn’t feel as involved for me as my druid or my shaman. Maybe it’s different now that 5.0.4 has hit – but I’m having such a blast PoMing my way around (seriously, does PoM not have just the best sound ever?) that I wonder if my poor paladin isn’t going to have the fate that my priest did this expansion. Max her trade skills, let her collect dust.

Anyhow, outside of the leveling bit, I’ve been doing quite a bit of reading (loving these Rizzoli and Isles novels that the show was based from!), some more cooking and trying out new recipes (some with more success than others), and debating if I should dig out some of the games collecting dust that I’ve never played, or started playing and never quite finished. Tate list is embarrassingly large. Lets see…what is on the list of shame:

Mario 3D (in progress!)

Kingdom Hearts for the 3DS

Super Princess Peach (where Peach has to rescue Mario!) on the DS

Bowser’s Inside Story (where the game is from Bowser’s PoV) on the DS

Epic Mickey, just need to finish! And it’s such a fun game.

Zelda (both of them….) on the Wii

Final Fantasy…whichever was the last one that came out on the PS3 (I started it, just never quite finished!)

Oh…and uh, Final Fantasy 12 (maybe?) was that the final one released on the PS2. (I think my PS2 s still hooked up…)

Dance Central on the Kinect (I still don’t have all the songs unlocked!)

Disney Adventures on the Kinect (may or may not still be in the packaging)

Super Mario Galaxy…the first one!

Guitar Hero Aerosmith

Portal 2 – lost when my HD crashed. I’ve reinstalled, just never gotten back to it.

Skyrim. I think I have like, 2? hours of time played.

Diablo 3 – I know that I’m no where near with finished with this game, I just haven’t gotten back to it in awhile.

Golden Eye – the remake – for PS3. Also may or may not be in the packaging, but in my defense I totally played the shit out of the original.

I’m sure this is only a fraction of my list, and if I sat down at home and went through my piles I’d have more to add. And perhaps some day I will get to them – if only that pesky WoW wasn’t in the way. I guess my thought process is that these games will always be there, but WoW is more fluid and ever changing that I don’t want to miss anything. But I can’t help wonder what I have missed because of my time in WoW. Bah. Well, anyhow, I think I might try to make my way through a game or two on this list in the next two weeks. Besides, if I don’t shorten my list how on earth will I convince Brade that I need Luigi’s Mansion 2 when it finally decides to release?

Anyhow, down time. I’ve plednty to do, just never enough time to get to it all. Or I just don’t make enough time. Probably a little bit of both!

16 responses to “Down Time”

I’m playing GW2 and loving it. I’m burnt out on WoW and I don’t want to either log in any time soon. I hope the fun factor comes back when MoP drops, because right now I don’t even feel like ordering it.

I have had “downtime” for a long time really, as we’ve been raiding only one night a week for quite a while. We aren’t stopping – these last couple of raids are fun to play with the new changes to our classes.

But in the extra time I’ve had, I decided to start exercising and eating better :) It’s great to have the time to focus on it again.

Playing TSW (me and 2 others… jks) and loving it. I didn’t realize it until playing at endgame, but a simple as dirt rotation (5xbuilder, finisher, finisher) makes tons of mental room for more varied and interesting boss mechanics, and I’m really enjoying paying more attention to the boss and less to my procs/CDs/mana/etc. This is something I think wow could pick up on – simplify the abilities, complexify the encounters!

Now if we can just get a nice shader mod for Torchlight 2 to darken the colors a bit and make it less cartoonish I think we will have a winner verdict over Diablo 3. I think its too early to write tl2 off just going by the beta.

I really got into Skyrim myself for a while. Spent days and even weeks playing it, didn’t even touch WoW except to log on and raid.. Anywho, I’ve just been leveling an alt until MoP, was hoping to hit 85 before it hit, but that won’t happen.

I am trying during this couple of weeks to find the enthusiasm to approach MoP. I have paid for it, but right now I feel like I’d rather pay for it again than have to do actually do it.

At this stage before the other xpacs I was super excited, had made lists and spreadsheets and applied for leave from work and was generally BUSTING to get at the new zones and new spells and new encounters.

Maybe 8 years is enough?

I don’t want to go through the mana-starved, healer-hate kickoff of Cata again. I don’t want to quest in congested zones with lag and bugs and PANDAS. I’ve always found the allure of vanity pets to be a mystery, but pet fights seem to take it to a new level of shudder-inducing tweeniedom. I don’t gotta catch ’em all.

Healing mushrooms are FAIL.

I feel like there’s this huge hump of yuk to get over before I’m anywhere near doing what I love – healing in a guild raid. And before then I have to sort out all my addons (apart from VuhDo which has been rock steady) and my UI and then start to relearn my class. I’m not as perfectionist as you Beru, but I need to be competent to have fun.

You know, each time something happens (guild, game, etc) I ask myself if maybe I’m just done with all of this. I keep trucking along, but I do suspect that my batteries are reaching the point they can no longer be recharged.

As for the healing, it’s not nearly as bad as it was in Cataclysm. But it is a bit different than what we left in DS.

The expansion is beautiful. I am actually looking forward to some of the non-raid things the most! (Challenge Modes, Pet Battles, Farming).

These two weeks off have given me a much needed break from WoW. I decided that after our last raid, I’d just let my subscription lapse and resub on the 24th or so. I can’t even put into words how nice the time away from WoW has been. I’ve been reading a lot more; just finished my 2nd book a couple days ago and started my third yesterday. I’ve also been playing a lot of Skyrim. I was at about 100 played hours. Since the two week break from WoW started, I am at 135 hours now. Not only has the break given me a chance to enjoy some other games, instead of AFKing in Orgimmar, it’s made me want to actually play ago. I wasn’t really excited about the expansion, I was bored of playing all day. But now, I am ready for Mists. I am actually excited to start playing again, and I can’t wait until we knock out some bosses!

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